Abstract : On 30 March, 1972, following heavy artillery preparations, three North Vietnamese Army (NVA) divisions spearheaded by tanks crossed the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) into South Vietnam. From the north and the west, they attacked and overran the thinly defended forward outposts and fire support bases held by the 3d Infantry Division, Republic of Vietnam Army (ARVN). Three days later, further south in Military Region 3, three other NVA divisions closed in on An Loc, 60 miles north of Saigon, after taking a district town near the Cambodian border. Then, on 14 April, two NVA divisions attacked troops of the 22d ARVN Infantry Division who manned the defenses of northwestern Kontum in Military Region 2 while directly to the east, in the lowlands of Binh Dinh Province, another NVA division struck at the province's three northern district towns.